© Kalle Marjola 2003-2004. For evaluation/testing purposes only. All other rights reserved. Special thanks to all models: Aija, Riikka, Vesa, Antti, and Jouni. Thanks to Markku, Riikka, Laura, Kikka, Tane, Pare, Tommi, Gniko, and all other playtesters and those who have otherwise helped.
B: The Summer Camp Slasher is a humorous a few minute cardgame for 2 or more players (4-6 is a very good number). It is very fast paced and practically summarizes a plot of a typical teen slasher movie.
In this game, each player represents a typical slasher movie teen, a young and usually pretty boy or girl who has arrived to some isolated summer camp where an unknown killer is lurking (or maybe it is one of the teens?). The aim of the game is simple: to stay alive to be the last survivor, to ensure that you get into the sequel and make big bucks! To achieve this, you send other teens to wander around the campsite while trying to stay in safe places and with other teens.
Shuffle the entire deck and then deals 4 cards for each player, putting the rest of the cards in the middle of the gaming board to work as a deck. The game is started by the player who won the previous game, or if none, by the youngest one. The game continues clockwise until all or all but one player has dropped from the game. The remaining teen, if any, makes it to the sequel and wins the game!
During each player's turn, the player must play one location or killer card. If she cannot, she discards her entire hand and draws new 4 cards and the game turn passes to the next player. Moreover, killer cards can only be played when each player has a location card in front of the player.
Location cards represent various places where the summer camp visitors (teens) wander, from the safest 'Main House' to the most hazardous 'Nature' locations. Each location card has a number that represent the threat level; the lower the number the most probably the killer strikes there. Moreover, regardless what the flavor text says, each teen in a same location (title name and number) is supposed to be in a physically same place, and if there is exactly two teens in the same place, they are classified as a pair and most probably they are doing something that would cause Restricted classification for the movie!
Location cards are played in front of the target player - that is, they can be played at any player - you, the one right of you or the one across the table. If a player already has a location card in front of her, the new location card is simply played on the top of that old card (the old card is not discarded).
When each teen has a location card (each teen has been introducted!), a killer card can be played instead. The killer card is played upside-down and announced ('the killer is about to strike!'). Any player can then play any reaction cards from her hand. The play order is completely free but players should wait that the previous reaction card has been handled before the next one is played. No other cards can be played and players do not fill their hand until the entire attack is over.
Flee is a typical reaction. When a teen flees, the topmost card of the deck is turned over. If it is a reaction or killer card, it is simply discarded (the teen simply topples over a cat, sees the killer and panics or runs in a circle!), but if it is a location, it is put in front of the player, to replace the old location (well, the teen can run around the same place, but that's another story).
In a simpler form, as soon as no player wants to play any reaction cards anymore, the killer strikes and the killer card is turned over. If this causes timing problems, any player (even those who have dropped!) can request, aloud, that the killer should now strike. If no other player plays any reaction cards as a reaction to that, the killer card is turned over - the requester cannot react to that no one plays any new reactions! However, if someone plays a reaction card, the request is cancelled and must be repeated.
Example: Fred plays killer card and requests a strike. As a reaction to that, Kim plays Panic!, resulting new locations to everyone. As Fred now runs to unadvantegous place, he plays Flee! to Jili before re-requesting the killer strike.
When the killer strikes, it normally kills teen(s) from the unsafest place. Here the number in each location card comes into account - the smaller the number the more hazardous the location is! Thus the Main House (number 5) is the safest location and Nature (number 1) is the unsafest. However, the killer never kills teens from a location where there is 3 or more teens at the same time. So, if there is 3 teens in Nature and one alone in the Main House, the one alone is going to die...
It is very possible that the player kills her own teen! This can happen when the player has no other cards to play than killer cards or when as a result of reaction cards she becomes the victim.
If any teens are killed, the corresponding player drops from the game and must discard any hand and table cards. Moreover, unless the killer card was a Secret Kill, all tabled location cards from all players are discarded, too.
If the killer card is negated with 'Just a Cat' reaction card or there are no suitable victims, nothing happens, the killer card is just discarded and the game continues from the next player. Location cards are not discarded in such a case.
After player's turn is over, all players fill their hand to 4 cards and the play proceeds to next player clockwise. This continues until no more than one player is left, who survives to the sequal and wins the game!
If the deck runs out, any discarded cards are shuffled to create a new deck. Already played location cards are not shuffled into that deck, unless first discarded because of a kill!
Kim, Jill, Fred and Anne are playing, in that order and Kim starting. Kim plays Front Yard to Fred, Jill plays Nature to Kim, Fred plays Main House to himself (replacing Front Yard). Anne has only killer and reaction cards in her hand, and as not all teens have a location card (she nor Jill does not have!), she discards her entire hand and draws 4 new cards and the turn passes back to Kim.
Kim plays Main House to himself, Jill plays Nature to Anne, Fred plays Back Room to Jill. Now everyone has a location, with Kim in Main House (safety 5), Jill in Back Room (safety 2), Fred also in Main House and Anne in Nature (safety 1). Anne can now play a killer card if she has any, or a new location card to any teen.
Anne takes a card and plays it upside-down in the middle of the gaming board, announcing that a killer is lurking! Anne requests that the killer is about to strike, to which Kim reacts by playing Flee reaction card to himself. A new card is turned over and it turns to be Main House - Kim's teen loses his nerve and runs around in the house! Anne repeats her request and no other player reacts anymore, so the killer card is revealed - it turns to be Sex Kills! The only pair is Kim and Fred in the main house, and thus the killer maims them!
Kim and Fred discards all their cards. Likewise Jili and Anne discard their location cards (their teens heard screams from inside and now run around!), fill their hand to 4 cards and the turn passes to Jili - the final part begins...
B: The Summer Camp Slasher deck consists of 64 cards, divided into 40 location, 12 killer and 12 reaction cards. Note that genuine card prints are not currently available, but you can use, for example, old business cards to write the card names on them (like my design deck!)
Location cards are played in front of the players. Cards can have a flavor text which does not affect gameplay.
Main House: 5 (14)
"playing piano, playing guitar, cooking, playing
cards, singing,.."
Beach: 4 (8) "BBQ, Sitting by the fire,.."
Front Yard: 3 (6)
"Smoking, Drinking Beer, Smoking a Joint"
Back Room: 2 (4)
"Taking a shower, Visiting the cellar"
Nature: 1 (8)
"Moonlight swim, Fetching stuff from the
shed, Nature calls, Tent fun"
Killer cards can only be played after each teen has a location.
Sex Kills (6) Kills a pair,
or if none, kills one alone, if any, in the
unsafest (smallest number) location.
Secret Kill (3) Kills one alone,
if any, in the unsafest (smallest number) location. Location
cards are not discarded.
Unexpected Kill (3) Kills one
alone, if any, in the safest (biggest number) location.
Reaction cards can only be played as a reaction to announced killer card, before the killer actually strikes.
Flee! (6) Target teen
flees (random location from the deck, killer/reaction has no
effect)
Panic! (3) Everyone flees
(random location from the deck, killer/reaction has no effect)
Just a Cat (3) The killer card is
negated. Cannot be played after Panic has been played.
Optional rules are simply that; optional rules that change the gameplay a bit. They make the game a bit different and use of them must be agreed beforehand.
Whenever player plays a location or a killer card, she can discard one other card from her hand, thus giving more control over the hand cards. Note that this means that the deck runs out faster and must be shuffled more often.